diff --git a/core/org.eclipse.cdt.ui/src/org/eclipse/cdt/internal/ui/text/TaskTagRule.java b/core/org.eclipse.cdt.ui/src/org/eclipse/cdt/internal/ui/text/TaskTagRule.java
index a0059f18b4c..67df33b3b79 100644
--- a/core/org.eclipse.cdt.ui/src/org/eclipse/cdt/internal/ui/text/TaskTagRule.java
+++ b/core/org.eclipse.cdt.ui/src/org/eclipse/cdt/internal/ui/text/TaskTagRule.java
@@ -15,7 +15,6 @@ package org.eclipse.cdt.internal.ui.text;
 
 import java.util.HashMap;
 import java.util.Map;
-import java.util.StringTokenizer;
 
 import org.eclipse.core.runtime.Assert;
 import org.eclipse.core.runtime.Preferences;
@@ -85,16 +84,6 @@ public final class TaskTagRule extends CombinedWordRule implements IPropertyChan
 			}
 		}
 
-		private String[] split(String value, String delimiters) {
-			StringTokenizer tokenizer= new StringTokenizer(value, delimiters);
-			int size= tokenizer.countTokens();
-			String[] tokens= new String[size];
-			int i= 0;
-			while (i < size)
-				tokens[i++]= tokenizer.nextToken();
-			return tokens;
-		}
-
 		/*
 		 * @see org.eclipse.cdt.internal.ui.text.CombinedWordRule.WordMatcher#addWord(java.lang.String, org.eclipse.jface.text.rules.IToken)
 		 */
diff --git a/core/org.eclipse.cdt.ui/src/org/eclipse/cdt/ui/text/TaskTagRule.java b/core/org.eclipse.cdt.ui/src/org/eclipse/cdt/ui/text/TaskTagRule.java
index 9a3408b4386..2d02080cb82 100644
--- a/core/org.eclipse.cdt.ui/src/org/eclipse/cdt/ui/text/TaskTagRule.java
+++ b/core/org.eclipse.cdt.ui/src/org/eclipse/cdt/ui/text/TaskTagRule.java
@@ -33,6 +33,7 @@ import org.eclipse.cdt.ui.IPropertyChangeParticipant;
  * @deprecated This class doesn't properly implement parsing of task tags
  * (see https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=246846). It will be removed.
  */
+@Deprecated
 public final class TaskTagRule extends WordRule implements IPropertyChangeParticipant {	
 	private static class TaskTagDetector implements IWordDetector {
 		public boolean isWordStart(char c) {